


Trust Fall (The Star Spangled Remix)

by callunavulgari



Category: Captain America (Movies), Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Friends With Benefits, Friendship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-13
Updated: 2015-06-13
Packaged: 2018-04-04 04:49:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4126015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callunavulgari/pseuds/callunavulgari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha told Steve about Fogwell’s on a Tuesday. “Very low profile,” she’d said, eyes firmly affixed to the horizon. “Discreet. I think you’d appreciate it.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trust Fall (The Star Spangled Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [marmolita](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marmolita/gifts).
  * Inspired by [After Hours](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3993235) by [marmolita](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marmolita/pseuds/marmolita). 



Natasha told Steve about Fogwell’s on a Tuesday.

“Very low profile,” she’d said, eyes firmly affixed to the horizon. “Discreet. I think you’d appreciate it.”

“I’ll check it out,” he’d replied, returning her faint smile with one of his own.

Fogwell’s Gym is located on the lower west side of the city. It’s a little bit older, a little bit run down, and smells of chalk and sweat, but Steve likes it that way. He’s a little bit old and run down himself.

It helps that the owner took one look at him, raised an eyebrow, and tossed a key Steve’s way.

“Come back after dark,” he’d told Steve with a shrug. “You look like the type to want the place to yourself.”

“You aren’t worried about theft?”

The older man snorted, giving Steve a wry smile. “The day Captain America burgles me is the day I pass the title for this place over to my cat.”

And that was that.

It works out well for him. He still spars with Natasha, still jogs circles around Sam, and if Thor isn’t off planet, they still beat the living daylights out of each other in Tony’s rec room, but this is different. It’s _his_ in a way that nothing else really is. There’s no SHIELD lurking just out of sight, no Fury to interrupt him with riddles, no JARVIS to pass inane messages along from Tony; it’s just Steve, his ghosts, and a dozen punching bags.

It’s a pretty swell arrangement, he thinks.

.

The first time that Steve meets Matt Murdock, he thinks it’s a little odd to be training with the lights off, even for a blind guy. Maybe _especially_ for a blind guy, alone in the dark, where no one would be able to hear if he hurt himself on some of the equipment and tried to call for help. But then he thinks that if anyone had tried to tell him that before, back when he was still just Steve Rogers, not Captain America, he would have socked them one, pale and sickly or not.

So he doesn’t judge.

He introduces himself politely, beats the sand out of a punching bag or two, and tries to pretend that he’s not disappointed that he has to share this space after all.

.

Slowly, Steve learns to appreciate having another body in the gym with him.

At first, it’s just nice to have another heartbeat in the background. Matt doesn’t know who he is, so Matt doesn’t much care that he’s sharing a gym with Captain America. Matt just accepts that Steve is there.

Sometimes they share brief snippets about their day.

“The weather was shit yesterday, wasn’t it?”

or

“Did you hear that the bridge was shut down for five hours earlier?”

Small talk. Inane things that one mentions to near strangers. Maybe a tip or two about stances or a laugh and a call of, “You keep taking out those punching bags like that, there won’t be any left.” But most of the time, they’re quiet. They say hello, work in silence for an hour or two, and they say goodbye. The gym isn’t just Steve’s anymore — it never really was — but it could be a lot worse.

Weeks go by and at some point, Steve starts to appreciate having another body in the gym for an entirely different reason.

The first time Steve catches himself eying the twist of Matt’s hips, he feels incredibly ashamed of himself. It’s not right, after all, to stare so blatantly at a man who can’t even catch you in the act. Taking advantage, like looking up a dame’s skirt just because the angle is good for it and she’s not paying attention. It’s not polite.

But the fact is, Matt is _distracting_.

He’s attractive, sure. But Steve has been surrounded by attractive people his whole life and never let it interfere with his work. Even before the serum — before Howard Stark and Peggy, before dancing chorus girls, before the Howling Commandos, and the _Avengers_ , Steve had Bucky.

He’s caught glimpses of things he shouldn’t have. Acknowledged the attractiveness of fellow soldiers. Even fantasized about kissing a few of ‘em. But there’s something about the idea that Matt won’t catch him at it that has him doing it more often than he should.

Steve doesn’t leer. He doesn’t act unseemly in any way, really. Just, sometimes he pays more attention to Matt than the bag in front of him. That’s all.

.

He sleeps with Matt on a Tuesday.

“I’m not looking for a relationship,” Steve tells him, because he’s found that it’s good to be honest about these things.

Matt gives him a grin and replies, “Good. Neither am I.”

It is good. Steve hasn’t… indulged much since he woke up from his decades long nap. He hasn’t been a virgin in a long time, not since he and Bucky were boys, but the 21st Century takes some getting used to. He knows, in an abstract sort of way, that there are loads of people that would jump to sleep with him. The people that he trusts enough to do that with though… those he can count on one hand.

Steve strokes them together and swallows Matt’s moans and thinks about all the ways that he could fuck Matt proper if he’d thought to prepare for this. If he’d thought it was even a possibility.

And after, when Matt smiles at him, and says, “I’d be happy to return the favor,” Steve thinks that he might take him up on that.

.

Two months later, they’ve fucked each other three more times and have progressed to actually sparring with each other more often than beating up punching bags. It’s good for the bags, and probably good for Steve’s bank account since he hasn’t had to replace them every week.

Steve hasn’t asked questions yet, about just how a blind man got so good at what he does that he can go toe to toe with Captain America and not walk away limping, but it’s lingered in the back of his mind more than once. He’s been doing this long enough now that he’s starting to notice the bruises on Matt’s body, the fatigue, and the sleep-bruised purple smeared under Matt’s eyes.

But, Steve always thinks, if Matt’s good enough not to press Steve on his identity, then it’s only right to return a kindness with a kindness.

.

It’s a Tuesday and there’s a man in black slumped in the alley outside of the gym. He’s got a mask covering the top half of his face, and even though he can’t possibly see through the thing, he looks up at Steve’s approach.

Steve’s been gone for over two weeks now, what with Ultron and falling cities, so he isn’t expecting it, but somehow, when those lips quirk upwards, he just _knows_.

“Captain America,” Matt says.

Steve snorts and bites his tongue on the urge to ask how long he's known. “Matt. Or do you have an alias too?’

Matt’s lips tick upwards. “I hear they’re calling me the devil of Hell’s Kitchen.”

“Bit of a mouthful, don’t you think? You should consider shortening it.” The grin grows, stretching those familiar lips wide enough to show teeth, and Steve feels heat rush to his face, unbidden. “You know I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Well,” Matt admits with a shrug, wincing when the movement pulls at something. His fingers curl against the dirty pavement and Steve watches curiously as Matt shifts so the building is taking most of his weight. “I didn’t come to get my dick sucked, that’s for sure.”

“Then what do you need?”

“Help,” he sighs. Then, with another wry smile. “I knew you’d show up here eventually. You always do.”

.

Two weeks later, Steve catches a glimpse of the television during breakfast. The place is crowded, so it’s loud enough that he can’t hear very well, but the diner’s been kind enough to turn on the closed captioning. It seems that there’s a new vigilante in Hell’s Kitchen.

“Daredevil,” Steve muses, biting down on a grin. “Much better.”

 


End file.
